About the project
In recent years, the notion of competence had gained an increased focus in mathematics education both internationally, but also in Norway, and the Norwegian mathematics curriculum described a general and complex mathematical competence as a necessity for being an active citizen in a democratic society. In the subject of mathematics, teaching and learning were closely related to engagement in tasks, and developing and assessing students’ mathematical competence depended largely on the types of tasks in which they engaged. However, little research existed on the role of mathematical competencies in solving tasks.
Methods and data
The study looked at different aspects related to the use of mathematical competencies when solving mathematical tasks, including teachers’ use of an item analysis scheme for recognising the competency demands of tasks, to what extent the mathematical competency demands could explain the difficulty of assessment tasks, and the types of tasks that teachers used to challenge high-achieving students. The study used both quantitative and qualitative methods and was based on data from the PISA study, a Norwegian grade 10 mathematics exam, teachers’ analysis of tasks, and tasks used in mathematics teaching.
Funding and research group
The project was a four-year doctoral research project (2014–2018), financed by the Department of Teacher Education and School Research at the University of Oslo. The project was part of the research group LEA: Large-scale Educational Assessment.